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Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Different Perspective; Part 2

So forget guns for a second, cause man that shit is getting OLD. From my reading at the National Safety Council, there are 15 things that kill more people than homicide in the US - sort of the big picture of how we end up in the grave. Most of the things are various diseases and I think humans have to die from something so it's not as if all of these things are epidemics in that context. Although, our food industry and medical/pharmaceutical industry have their sticky fingers all over most of these diseases. At any rate, accidents are among the 15. So I think everyone has been saying firearm deaths amount to 11 thousand, varying from year to year of course, but that is the number they like.

So 2,500 people choke to death in America, children are at the greatest risk and hot dogs are one of the big culprits because of their shape and size. Hot dogs banned, far more children protected than gun control. If we get rid of small toys, balloons, gummy bears and their like, we can probably save a thousand lives. By the way, "choking hazard" warnings on toys is another case where "signs" simply don't protect people.

2,700 people die in fires. Smoking kills plenty of people by itself but it also burns them to death. Cigarettes and candles, banned, thousands saved.

Twenty five THOUSAND people fall to death. That has to suck bad. Ban stairs, tens of thousands saved. Playgrounds, my God, they are DEATH traps! This is more deaths than all homicide (16,000) all by itself.

39,000 poisoned. Accidentally ingesting illegal drugs is a top source. I had no idea about this. Drugs kill all kinds of people in lots of indirect ways but accidentally taking them? Damn! Kids hanging out under the kitchen sink and pain killers. I'm not even sure what we can ban here? I know a lot of children die this way and negligence comes to mind right away. Again, more deaths than homicides.

42,000 killed in vehicle accidents. I couldn't figure out if drunk driving is mixed in here. Drunk driving deaths aren't accidents, they are negligent homicide, at least that's how I see it. If we could just ban vehicles we'd save thousands. Texting kills an awful lot of young people. Ban it! Way more deaths than homicides, and again, I'm not sure if we're talking drunk drivers, but what I do know from some more digging is that drunk drivers kill as many, or more (from year to year) than guns do, fluctuating from 10,000 to 17,000.

2,000 drown. Children in swimming pools mostly - supposedly the number 1 cause of injury death for children 1-4 years old. I want to ban swimming pools mostly because I can't afford one, but just imagine how many kids could be saved.

Accidental firearm deaths. Wait for it, this one is a whopper; 600.

What do most accidents have in common when it comes to kids? Negligence. It's funny because I think Adam Lanza's mother is (was) guilty of the exact same thing. What kind of laws are we going to pass to fix this problem? To me, banning guns, and being the type of person who wants them banned, is like saying you aren't responsible enough to handle potentially dangerous things, and you aren't responsible for your own safety. Apparently it's true. America has worn away at responsibility and integrity to the point that we kill ourselves by accident more than criminals kill people on purpose! And we purposefully kills ourselves (suicide) more often as well. Now our government wants to pass laws confirming that you are irresponsible morons who have proven that you can't even keep your children safe around swimming pools, firearms, poisons, drugs, or hot dogs. Rather than taking things away from people who are responsible enough to handle them, how about we punish the idiots who aren't, for the deaths that result from their negligence? I guess suffering the consequences of your actions isn't a value we uphold in America anymore. Gun owners who are responsible for the accidental deaths I talked about above only strengthen the anti-gun argument and you have no business owning a firearm if you can't take responsibility for it. Overall I'm talking about integrity. No one uses the word anymore, probably because most people don't have any. This is what I see as the greatest problem in America and I know with absolute certainty that gun-laws, which have no relevance to it, can do nothing to improve it.